Rick Minter, Senior Writer
Rick Minter joined The Atlanta Journal-Constitution in 1991, where he covered motorsports as well as serving as a bureau chief. From 2000-2008 he focused on racing exclusively, traveling the NASCAR circuit as the paper’s motorsports writer and winning awards from several organizations including the Georgia20 Automobile Racing Hall of Fame Association and the City of Atlanta. Minter and his wife Joanne live on the family farm in Inman, Ga. In his spare time he collects and restores antique tractors and trucks.
Articles by Rick Minter
By Rick Minter | Senior Writer
RacinToday.com
Throughout his long and storied career in the circuit now known as Sprint Cup, Richard Petty enjoyed much success in the state of Georgia, where the Cup circuit runs this Sunday night at Atlanta Motor Speedway in the Atlanta suburb of Hampton.
Petty grabbed six of his 200 career wins at [...]
By Rick Minter | Senior Writer
RacinToday.com
When Dale Earnhardt Jr. is pondering the key moments in his racing career, one that often comes to mind is Lap 312 of the fall race at Atlanta Motor Speedway in 2004.
At that point in that race, Earnhardt was in the driver’s seat, so to speak, as far as the [...]
By Rick Minter | Senior Writer
RacinToday.com
Some Thursday Observations:
*An off weekend for the Sprint Cup Series gives the Nationwide and Camping World Truck circuits a chance to share top billing.
The trucks run at Chicagoland while the Nationwide set is on the road course in Montreal.
At Chicago, Ron Hornaday Jr. and crew chief Rick Ren will be [...]
By Rick Minter | Senior Writer
RacinToday.com
A week from Sunday, NASCAR’s Sprint Cup Series will return to the South for a Labor Day weekend race. Traditionalists likely will argue that the race should be held at Darlington Raceway, where the Southern 500 was a Southern Labor Day spectacle for decades.
But there are many around Atlanta who [...]
By Rick Minter | Senior Writer
RacinToday.com
Bristol, Tenn. – There’s nothing quite like a morning spent in the pit area at Bristol Motor Speedway to get some lively debate going about all things NASCAR.
Early on a somewhat gray day, Mike Brown, the general manager of TRG Motorsports’ Sprint Cup effort, leaned against a stack of tires [...]
By Rick Minter | Senior Writer
RacinToday.com
Some Thursday Observations:
* The Sharpie 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway has a history of being a “can’t miss” event for NASCAR fans. But there are worries in some quarters that the emphasis on the making the Chase will have some of the top drivers points racing and trying to avoid [...]
By Rick Minter | Senior Writer
RacinToday.com
Ron Hornaday Jr. has a chance tonight at Bristol Motor Speedway to extend his Camping World Truck Series win streak to a record six, which would be the first time in decades that a driver in a major NASCAR division won that many consecutive races.
Richard Petty is the all-time leader [...]
By Rick Minter | Senior Writer
RacinToday.com
The Earnhardt Nation has reason to rejoice. Its driver is starting to act like an Earnhardt again. It was evident last week during an appearance in Atlanta and it showed again on Sunday during the Carfax 400 at Michigan International Speedway, where he put on a hard charge at the [...]
By Rick Minter | Senior Writer
RacinToday.com
Dale Earnhardt Jr. was in Atlanta this week, promoting the upcoming Pep Boys Auto 500 at Atlanta Motor Speedway. It’s part of the obligations that fall on recent race winners in NASCAR. Each track gets a day’s time from recent winners to use to promote upcoming races. As bad as [...]
By Rick Minter | Senior Writer
RacinToday.com
In a recent article by my RacinToday.com colleague Bill Fleischman, the legendary promoter Humpy Wheeler said he’d heard enough trendy names and longed for a time when drivers with colorful names like Possum Jones and Banjo Matthews showed up in starting line-ups.
The driver Wheeler’s looking for might just be a [...]